Star Force: Mantle (SF92) (Star Force Origin Series) Read online

  If they brought bad guys to bash that’d be one thing, but sucking off their supplies was just not fair. That said, the universe had a tendency to not be fair, hence she looked at this as another challenge, immediately sending out new construction orders for additional bioharvest structures located in the most efficient places to build…which she guessed would be some of the hollowed out asteroids. Even if the sedas could provide food to this fleet, sooner or later more would be needed and it was her job to think ahead, so she put in the construction order, reluctantly redirecting resources away from current projects, and got teams established and in planning phase before she even bothered replying to the Bwetti, asking for specifics as to their situation, ship status, and intentions.

  The answer she belatedly got back was grim, as expected. They’d barely made it here and some of their ships hadn’t, to which she immediately dispatched a cargo convoy with warship escort to retrace the Bwetti’s path here and find the ships that had dropped off. If there were any survivors they were to be top priority for recovery. If not, there was no need to waste valuable resources and they were ordered to salvage the ships and tow them back here, either to give to the Bwetti or to recycle for themselves.

  In the explanation of how they’d come to be here, the Bwetti had cited several other races that had fallen to the Hasgoul and the rumor in the region of Star Force. They were coming in from afar to bring order to the chaos and the locations of all known Star Force systems were being spread around from race to race, explaining how they’d known that Canderous was were. Probably a passing ship had noticed them and then rumor did the rest, meaning that there could be other refugees heading this way asking for help.

  And that’s exactly what the Bwetti were asking for. Help. They didn’t care in what form. Even offering to serve as slave labor if Star Force would take them in. They were desperate and on the verge of being wiped out due to malnutrition, meaning Isha needed to act now before any more of them died within sight of rescue.

  What their biology required was the subject of further transmissions as medical teams were assembled along with cargo ships and boarding parties…in full armor. This was an entirely unknown race, and as Star Force had the previous experience with the Kiritas to pull from, starving people would act irrationally, especially in sight of food. Her troops could maintain order, and if a stun blast killed one of them there would be medical personnel on sight to hopefully revive them…but at this point everything was up in the air given their unknown biology.

  This was an entirely different type of war, but Canderous was a civilization of warriors from top to bottom and they were going to fight it just as passionately. The enemy was time, logistics, and the cruelty of the galaxy…and Isha would be damned if they didn’t save every last one of them physically possible. Her real worry was that there were too many of them, or that there would be more coming, and that Canderous would have to say no to some of them. To tell them they’d have to die within reach of help because there wasn’t enough to go around.

  Which was why she immediately put the construction crews to work building the infrastructure to increase their supplies, for that was a message she did not intend to send to anyone…ever.

  10

  July 19, 3466

  Interstellar Space (Rim Region)

  Lizard jumpship

  Thrawn walked through the corridors of the anonymous jumpship upon which he rode. It traveled in a fleet of 382 carrying cargo and warships, but mostly the former. The leader of the Star Force-loyal Li’vorkrachnika had left their holdings in the occupation zone in the hands of others a long time ago, traveling out to the chaotic warfront that was left in the shadow of The Nexus as it retreated. It had been publicized as a handover, but he knew otherwise. They could not hold their territory so they were abandoning parts of it. Fortunately for the races out here, the trailblazers were eager to dive into a challenge beyond their current capacity and fight to save and annex them into their empire.

  Paul had done the same with him, refusing to give up on what seemed to be an impossible task. He’d had to trick him into questioning his own loyalty to the templars, and in doing so proved his guile and his worthiness to lead. If not, Thrawn would have been dead at his own hand long ago, so he took it on faith that the trailblazers could handle this, even if he could not see how they were going to do it.

  And that trilled him. Facing up against an unbeatable challenge and potentially finding a way to overcome it. The size of the Rim Region was larger than everything the Li’vorkrachnika had claimed prior to coming into contact with Star Force, and that had taken them century upon century of diligent expansion…yet the trailblazers were taking on the mantle of the whole thing immediately. It was reckless, but he knew them to be anything but, and he’d had a very long discussion with Paul on the matter before he left to come out here.

  Thrawn had followed much later, but was operating independently of any Star Force faction. That was the trust he had in him, as well as being a functional necessity. The geography was so massive there was no way to keep Thrawn under surveillance and use him effectively. He had to be released to do what Li’vorkrachnika had been doing for as long as he lived…expand, and that’s exactly what he was doing now.

  After establishing several supply routes out from H’kar territory and bypassing the grid system and black hole jumps, Thrawn had established a base of operations within the Rim Region and had been receiving a steady flow of supplies from Krachnika and the rest of his ‘cabal’ systems…those that held the Li’vorkrachnika that had served the templars and the worlds that Star Force had never conquered. The inheritance from the others that still served their dubious masters was his now to use, but everything new being built was fashioned along different lines.

  The Paladin were the future, and some day he’d take on their blue coloration as well, but Paul and his kin weren’t finished crafting them and Thrawn knew that such things did not occur quickly. Each time the templars had added a new variant there were thousands of revisions necessary until they were fully absorbed into the codex…a codex that he now knew was faulty. Faulty because the templar could not count on their loyalty and required lies to keep them bound to their cause. Thrawn now looked upon it with suspect, but also familiarity, for it was the codex that he was born into and had used to command and conquer up until he had been defeated and captured.

  The codex he was using now was augmented by both himself and Paul, but he was no longer receiving updates from the Paladin and would not until they were complete. That was appropriate, for he didn’t need to be experimenting. He needed a genetic and technological codex that was predictable and seasoned, so a lot of his own experimenting he’d undone, reverting back to the base codex plus the few alterations that had proved both successful and reliable. They were upgrades to the old system and proven now in battle multiple times over, but not sufficient for the long term.

  Everything he was building here and back in the cabal was temporary, massive as it was. It was temporary because the trailblazers needed his current power, but even still there were telltale Star Force influences on the architecture of every world he now colonized or refurbished, and he made a point of incorporating their symbol wherever possible. The yellow/tan coloration still held, even on the newer ship designs, with the blue reserved for the Paladin as a measure of respect.

  Thrawn had no command over the transitional Paladin. They were fully integrated into the 10 Clans of Paul’s trailblazer squadmates and carrying out orders directed by them. Thrawn’s Li’vorkrachnika, still going by that name until they earned the title of Paladin, answered directly to the masterminds that commanded them, and they all answered to him. There were over a thousand now and assigned to much smaller tasks than previously would have been considered prudent, but their guidance was necessary to make sure the minions did as they were supposed to and did not bring shame to their name by violating Paul’s protocols.

  That meant every world had a mastermind or would,
save for limited installations. The system Thrawn’s convoy was headed to was the third expansion in the Rim Region, or rather the third sector expansion. Already there were two with limited core worlds established and guarded, and Thrawn had and always would be traveling to the startups while leaving others to handle the controlled growth of the others. Where there was the most need is where he went, as well as requiring his subservient masterminds to gain experience beyond their mere genetic memory. It was useful, but not enough to make a complete war leader, and he had to make do with what he had available…which meant an overly inexperienced group of masterminds.

  Those captured were still proving their loyalty until the trailblazers cleared them. There was no direct contact, but they were monitoring their thoughts from behind walls so insure that any change of allegiance was legitimate. So far they hadn’t made the necessary transition, but there were a few that were noted as becoming close. Thrawn would use them if and when they were cleared, but he was not counting on their inclusion. He had to grow a new leadership class and get them experience without compromising his duty…yet another challenge that he was not reluctant to accept.

  One of the changes that had been permitted to his technology codex was the upgrade of his gravity drives, making his Li’vorkrachnika ships faster than anything the templar had, which was a necessity given the distances involved out here. One sector to another was over 200 lightyears in distance, and within each a seed was planted that would grow with time. Right now the two previous seeds were already engaged in small battles within their claimed patrol zones running off or destroying pirates and scouts from greedy neighbors, but larger combat was looming as Thrawn ran over the map his own scouts were continuously updating.

  There were a multitude of threats in his assigned sectors, some of which he’d been told not to engage, leaving them to the Clans or others. He was to pick off the weaker targets as he grew his population and resource base, for if he encountered too much attrition he’d never grow as large as necessary to begin to make a significant impact out here.

  Walking through the ship corridors he passed slight indentations in the walls, ceiling, and floor that held the Star Force symbol cleverly hidden within familiar architecture that had a few improvements added. He’d been onboard a Paladin jumpship before and it was nothing like this model, with too many changes for him to rely upon. Thrawn could adapt to whatever was given to him, but how his minions would was a question mark and they thrived in environments that had been ironed out so thoroughly where every action was patterned and remembered. This allowed them to adapt to exterior circumstances while holding to their codex.

  Alter the codex and you risked destabilizing the foundation on which the Li’vorkrachnika were built.

  He trusted Paul to do it in a fast and comprehensive manner, whereas if Thrawn had continued to do so here he’d have to take small, cautious steps…and right now he did not want to be cautious. He had to be bold and dive into the unknown in order to hold to his mandate, and one did not do that with an uncertain codex.

  But that hadn’t stopped him from keeping and continuing to make some changes, one of which was quite recent. In sector 1 they had come across and cleared a conquered planet of those that had obliterated the previous population. Upon analyzing the technology left behind they’d discovered a useful alloy previously unknown and had begun integrating it into their codex. Star Force probably already knew about the material, but the awesome power of their technology was reserved for the Paladin. Thrawn was using his own plus some necessary enhancements, and so long as they were tasked with the widespread but small threats out here they would be more than adequate to the task.

  Slightly different, yet altogether familiar. That’s how his new ships felt. They had greater capacity but no so much so that he didn’t know their strengths and weaknesses by feel. They were an extension of himself, as were all the minions onboard, and he could feel the harmony of purpose amongst them. The upgrades made hadn’t unsettled them. They’d adapted, as Li’vorkrachnika always did, and now they were stronger, ship by ship, than ever before.

  When Thrawn eventually reached a control room separate from the bridge several librarians passed him updated reports but the rest of his personal staff kept quiet and to their tasks while waiting for additional orders as he went to the map again, bringing up the excessive amount of information that they’d been collecting. He still hadn’t assimilated it all yet, so during this trip and others he spent a great deal of time simply staring at the geography of the numerous new regions out here as his mind spiraled off on numerous tangents that the minions around him couldn’t even guess at.

  When the fleet arrived at their destination they moved into orbit around an empty, nearly barren wasteland of breathable air and sparse vegetation. There was little water on the planet, but that was easy enough to overcome with technology. There were other resources here and it was a strategic point that Paul had directed him to, though he let Thrawn make the final decision for himself and he’d conquered with the selection. There were no major threats nearby, nor any trade routes of significance. It was a little unnoticed corner of the greater Dubrai Region that Clan Cookie was tasked with, but an area they would not be able to exert any influence in for centuries as greater priorities would always consume their attention.

  Upon settling into a stable orbit, the jumpships released their warships and colonizing ships…the latter being an upgrade that took cruiser hulls and turned them into mobile factories patterned after Star Force’s MCVs. Cruisers had always had this capacity in limited amounts, able to spawn entire new colonies just by landing on a planet and dosed with an abundance of time, but these new ships increased the growth rate considerably. They held no weapons, so they couldn’t operate independently, but given the multitude of threats out here and his newfound reluctance to gamble the lives of his people, he wasn’t colonizing planets with single ships, or even pairs. Every expansion was going to be in force in order to protect it and to hasten the development.

  So to that end, part of the cruisers stayed in orbit for defensive purposes while the rest split up and spread out across the system pulling a more detailed survey than the scout he’d sent previously. The colony cruisers headed down to the surface and landed in various places, spilling out workers and equipment that immediately took to building mining facilities and setting up prefab structures…another addition Thrawn had picked up from Star Force. Normally the Li’vorkrachnika just built new technology on site, for their skillset was that impressive, but the specific collapsible structures that gave them workshops and small hatcheries immediately upon arrival were an improvement…on planets that weren’t contested. Thrawn wouldn’t be colonizing in that aggressive fashion any more save for special occasions. Paul needed him to grow, and that meant picking systems where there would be no distractions from building.

  During the flow of transports to and from the cargo jumpships Thrawn transferred down to the surface and took up command there in one of the grounded colony ships, moving about without informing others so that no one could track him unless he wished it. His authority always derived from his body, for he was his rank and his genetic marker was all the leverage he would ever need. The minions responded to him on sight, so there was never any bickering over assignments that other races stupidly had. Every Li’vorkrachnika here was devoted to their purpose, and had been born into a form to maximize their potential. It gave them an advantage over the Humans and others, who only had one form, though the trailblazers had gone to great efforts diversify though other means.

  With the Li’vorkrachnika there was no question as to who did what, and when he arrived on the surface he simply walked into the ship and was treated as if he was supposed to be there. Minimal surprise was the only reaction he ever received, and it never lasted for more than a second. He was allowed to move freely without question or adulation, observing the status of the planet and any difficulties involved with its conquest, but eventually he returned
to his study of the region as he dispatched several of the jumpships to scout the surrounding systems and received back updates that confirmed the prediction that Paul had made.

  Thrawn was on his own out here, mostly, but there was shipping moving through a trade route 6 jumps away belonging to a larger power. Not one so large that it was on the ‘don’t touch’ list, but one that he couldn’t contend with just yet and one whose intent hadn’t been determined. Too little information was available, and while they might turn out to be a neutral or ally, he never assumed as much. Everyone was a threat until proven otherwise, and given that the resources coming in from the cabal worlds were going to sector 1, he had to build everything in 3 locally…which meant not picking any fights just yet as he set up shop.

  Occasionally Thrawn would go outside and sniff the air. It was hard and bitter, but it was raw and free. There was no safety net here. No Star Force fleet waiting to be called upon for support. It was conquer or be destroyed, and that was a very familiar mindset for him and the rest of the Li’vorkrachnika. They’d been told their entire lives that if they didn’t expand they’d be consumed by others and that every race they took down was a threat eliminated.

  It had been a templar lie, and for his part in the conquests of those worlds that did not deserve it he was regretful, but there was no point in dwelling on a past that could not be changed. Paul had decided he was worthy of saving and converting, and with that endorsement he’d never doubted his cause. He’d been misdirected by the templars, a tool inappropriately used, but the trailblazers would not make that mistake. They’d set him loose against real threats, and Paul had already forged him into a shield for those that needed protecting. It gave truth to the lie that the templars had bred into them, and ironically had prepared them for this moment…for they were more outmatched here than ever before, and it was going to take a lot of effort and fortuitous use of opportunities just to survive out here.